Germany apologizes for leopard jibe that upset some Africans

CAPE City, South Africa (AP) — Germany apologized on Thursday for making use of a leopard emoji in a jibe at Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Twitter that finished up offending some Africans.

The German international ministry poked pleasurable at Russia’s best diplomat during his tour of Africa when it tweeted that he was not there wanting for leopards, but making use of the excursion to try out and justify Russia’s complete-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The tweet, and the leopard emoji the foreign ministry utilised on its formal account, played off Germany’s selection to send some of its innovative Leopard 2 tanks to Ukraine to assistance its military battle off Russian forces.

But an African Union official took offense at what she explained was the continent being portrayed as only about wild animals. Ebba Kalondo, the spokeswoman for AU Chairman Moussa Faki Mahamat, tweeted back again to the German government account questioning if Africa, its persons and its wildlife was “just a joke to you?”

“Foreign policy is not a joke nor ought to it be made use of to score low-cost geopolitical details by illustrating an overall Continent with colonial tropes,” Kalondo wrote in a follow-up tweet.

The German international ministry apologized and mentioned that the tweet was not meant to offend, but relatively “to phone out the lies that Russia utilizes to justify its imperialist war of aggression from Ukraine.”

Lavrov has visited South Africa, Eswatini, Angola and Eritrea this week, wherever he has repeated his promises that the United States and its Western allies are employing Ukraine as a software in a “hybrid war” from Russia.

Several African nations nevertheless hold historical ties with Moscow. South Africa was a single of several to abstain from a U.N. vote previous yr condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Eritrea voted versus the resolution together with Russia, Belarus, North Korea and Syria.